Mrs. Clinton’s clever comeback implied that she understood “overcharge” in terms of charging too much money. We may even credit her with referring to the difference between an observed market price and a price that would have been observed in the absence of collusion, which was what many suspected the oil-producing nations were doing last year. In that sense, and only in that sense, was Hillary’s comment meaningful and amusing.

The problem is that the word “peregruzka” has nothing to do with economics. As students of foreign languages well know, most words have multiple meanings, and their combinations almost never coincide in different languages. Thus, the English word “overcharge” may mean many things to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, but they are all translated into Russian by completely different words that are not interchangeable. In economic terms, “overcharge” becomes “obschitat’” or “zavysit’ tsenu” — but never “peregruzka.”

Perhaps, the embarrassment could be avoided if Lavrov had translated it literally, as “overload.” But in the context of a red button, he chose a more specific electrical term “overcharge,” meaning “too much amperage in the circuit.”

As a result, to the Russian-speaking audience, Hillary’s retort “We won’t let you do that to us” could only mean one thing: “Americans won’t let Sergey Lavrov give them too much amperage.”

The confusion could also be avoided if, instead of Hillary Clinton, the job of Secretary of State was performed by a professional — like Condoleezza Rice, who speaks fluent Russian, and who wouldn’t have opted for the lame plastic button because this joke doesn’t work in Russian to begin with.

Russian is a rich and flexible language with versatile descriptive means, but it just doesn’t have a short universal word that embraces all the meanings of the allusive English “reset.” The word “perezagruzka” (“reload”), which later was claimed to be the right term, comes off just as awkward and uninspiring as any other possible translation. Anyone with a sense of the Russian language could’ve told Clinton that the gag was a dud.

Other reports indicate that “Hillary Clinton raised eyebrows on her first visit to Europe as secretary of state when she mispronounced her EU counterparts’ names and claimed U.S. democracy was older than Europe’s.” In one particular case, she kept referring to European Commission External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner as “Benito,” invoking the memories of Mussolini.

This looks rather ironic, considering that the current leaders in Washington had come to power by accusing their conservative predecessors of being pig-headed and deaf to other cultures and nuances. Turns out, they were merely projecting their own image on their opponents, given that they themselves can’t even distribute party favors to foreigners without a screw-up.

But let’s not be too hard on Hillary — according to her, the button was also a gift of friendship from President Obama and Vice President Biden. All things considered, the gaffe was the result either A or B:

A) The Obama administration is made of pig-headed, tone-deaf people, who don’t expect other cultures to have nuances — and so they don’t bother to consult with experts.

B) Experts chosen by the Obama administration are incompetent sycophants who got hired because they were political hacks, or as a result of favoritism, nepotism, or affirmative action — and they will uncritically ramrod their bosses’ ideas even if it’s contrary to reality and common sense.

Either way we’re screwed.

Why couldn’t have Hillary consulted with someone competent — like me, for example? Without overcharging, I would’ve advised her to give Lavrov the People’s Cube instead of the button.

It requires no tricky translation and is easy to understand in any language or culture. Remember Hillary’s campaign speech about “invisible Americans?” Well, if you translate “out of sight, out of mind” into Russian, you will get “invisible lunatics.”

Which accurately describes what competent people in this country have become since the last election.

Oleg Atbashian, a writer and graphic artist from the former USSR, is the author of Shakedown Socialism, of which David Horowitz said, "I hope everyone reads this book." In 1994 he moved to the U.S. with the hope of living in a country ruled by reason and common sense, appreciative of its freedoms and prosperity. To his dismay, he discovered a nation deeply infected by the leftist disease of "progressivism" that was arresting true societal progress. Oleg is the creator of a satirical website ThePeoplesCube.com, which Rush Limbaugh described on his show as "a Stalinist version of The Onion."

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1.
JW

Goodness, isn’t this the “smartest” woman in the world????

We’re seeing how “smart” all these democrats really are now..

It seems the old saying, “people who live in glass house’s, shouldn’t throw rocks”..is a very apt description of the folks in the Obama administration…..

We’ve been told this is the smartest woman in the world for almost 20 years, but she was hidden away from the public for much of her husband’s administration (no one was happier than Willie, one presumes) or trotted out only in heavily scripted appearances during her Senate days (remind you of anyone else?). This woman has always personified the phrase “tone-deaf” and her “foreign policy expertise” and “strength” consists of a few calculated votes to make her look Presidential. Domestic policy was always her long suit and she wasn’t very good at that, either.

Mr. Atbashian gives us an A or B choice about the reasons for this administration’s incompetence. More like A AND B.

In any case, if there’s one thing for which the world can thank Barack Obama, it’s undoubtedly saving us from President Hillary.

Arrrggghhh! What a ship of fools! It already seems clear that Obama and co. are shocked, shocked! to realize that foreign relations is part of the job description!

I’ve been pondering lately how the modern liberal concept of multiculturalism may merely be cover for not actually knowing anything about other cultures. After all, it is easy to be warm and fuzzy when you don’t know anything about them; and by the same token if you really believe that there are no substantive differences, it give one tacit permission not to bother actually studying them. Has that sort of rationalized laziness now reached the State Department? Didn’t these media keep telling us that these were the smart people?

I am reminded of once being in a meeting in France in which the American speaker made a joke that didn’t translate (yes I, one of those neanderthal conservatives, do in fact speak a foreign language, thank you very much). The translator paused for a moment, and then said: “he just made a joke, everyone please laugh”. The audience let out a genuine laugh, and the speaker continued on, blissfully unaware. Funny, in that case, but it was warm-hearted in context. Shouldn’t our diplomats be capable of more? And then Clinton piles it on with an embarrassing attempt to recover! As a good friend often says, “the first rule, when you are in a hole, is to stop digging…”

And on that note, what on earth was Obama thinking with that DVD set for Gordon Brown? Did he send the Secret Service to buy it at Target for him, or does Michelle keep a closet full of white elephant gifts to give out when caught unprepared? Or maybe he thought it was heartfelt and meaningful to give out his favorite movies. In that case, we have elected our first Teenager-in-Chief! What is he going to do next, start distributing his own mix tapes?

It won’t be long before the world’s opportunists start taking full advantage of the Obama administration’s ineptitude and incompetence. For the moment, I think they’re still in stunned disbelief that Americans elected such a crop of fools – but they’ll get over it.

1) underestimate their group IQ;
2) overestimate their hubris;
3)overestimate the amount of damage they are willing to inflict, both domestically and internationally; and
4)project how low they will go in the next news cycle.

They are impossible to joke about because the joke always, very quickly, becomes reality.

There are thousands of career employees within the State Department. Surely two or three of them speak Russian. Were they all on vacation this week? Or is this a sign that the political appointees think they’re smarter than the specialists?

The reason Hillary is the smartest woman in the world and BO is brilliant is because academia and all those who make up the rules as to who is and isn’t smart are a bunch of leftie dolts who are, in reality, quite stupid.

I recall Jimmy Carter going to Poland where he said in a speech that he loved the Polish people. The translator got it wrong when he used the verb “to love” in its most carnal sense. To this day I still get the heebie-jeebies when a politician claims he loves his country.

It can’t be long now before the neo-Coms in Moscow realize they’re dealing with some very familiar types in this administration. Useful idiots. At that point, relations between Obama’s America and Putin’s Russia are sure to improve.

The Associated Press would like Americans to believe that our representatives have no clue what they are doing. Judging from comments on the various message forums Americans are gullibly buying the simplistic explanation that our State department supposedly doesn’t know how to translate the word “reset” into Russian. Nonsense! The Russian word peregruzka appears at the top of the button, spelled in latin letters. If this was meant to be a literal translation, why would the letters be in Latin? The english translation for this word is “overload” and anyone that knows how to type a few letters into an online translation website can easily figrue that much out. An english word appears below the button and that word is “reset”. These words do very much make sense together: when something is overloaded (like a circuit), you reset it.

Oh dear the perils and pitfalls of foreign languages that naifs can fall into.

How many Spanish girls have told me they are leraning English in order to find a “yob”? To which I usually reply that a yob is less likely to be interested in the level of their English than that of their mini-skirt. Or the French student who on informing the class that she “‘ate dogs” was perplexed to find the Korean student enthusiastically agreeing. Then there was the Russian student who informed the class that his wife made him “breakfust” every morning. Unfortunately, in a breathtaking feat of internal spoonerism, he managad to invert the final two letters of each syllabla.

And just why exactly do Japanese girls break down in uncontrollable, hand-over-mouth gigglea when an Italian says “chin-chin”? Why the wry grin when a Spaniard is asked how he’d like his eggs done? And please don’t ask what “Bush” means in Maltese or mix up your genders when ordereing chicken in Spanish. In fact, always be very careful when referring to either seafood or small furry animals in any language.

Mind you it rubs both ways. What is rarely appreciated is the level of misunderstanding caused by phonetic confusions such as the “Piss Process” or the “War on Tourism”. It’s extremely important that when Hirally Crinton deals with the Chinese she understand exactly what they mean by “fried rice”, “correctivism” and “human rights”. Furthermore, given his recent appearance at a late night rave at the White House, how many present mistakenly thought that Stevie was singing “My Sharia Amour”? And BTW, the answer to the Australian greeting “How ya going?” is not “by armour-plated stretch-limo dood”.

Looking forward to the next episode of the “Hillarity Clingon Show” coming all too soon on BHO state TV.

“Push the reset button” is an American idiom that dates from the early 1950′s. At that time Stalin was in charge, so the Russian equivalent is “have them all shot.” The phrase wouldn’t make sense on a button, of course, even if that button is red. It should appear on a machine gun pin. The machine gun may appropriately be red while the victims were often pink.

“It seems the old saying, “people who live in glass house’s, shouldn’t throw rocks”..is a very apt description of the folks in the Obama administration…..

wonder what that translates too in Russian?”

“люди, которые живут в стеклянном доме, не должны бросить скалы.”

JW, to be fair, I do not speak Russian; I used an intrnet translation site. But, unlike Hillary and her coterie of idiots, I took the resulting Russian and translated it back into English to see what would happen:

“People who live in the glass house, should not throw a rock.”

You’d think that being in the State Department where you want to do as little as possible to insult your neighbors, at least that level of care would be exercised.

Once again our government of preppies and Ivy Leaguers, by Ps and ILs and for Ps and Ils proves the joke that American higher education has become. From the monied halls of learning from which the American ruling class come there could not be found a scholar of Russian that could have prevented this ‘faux pas’, by the way Hilary that means mistake in French but since you are the smartest woman in the Americanized world you already know that. Here is a foreign language saying for the the new democrat regime. America Nova delenda est.

I think you are too kind to Lavrov here. He did not come up with the proper translation for “peregruzka” as “overload” because his English is good, but not that good (and not because he was too literate).

Everything else is very good, as per your high standards. Keep it up. Thanks

The USA is built by hard working guys sweating on buildings, railroads and in factories and by shrewd capitalists that gave value for a dollar and designed and built big ships, factories and software. But we send abroad these talentless hacks whose only ability is . . .what again?

Miss “Two For One” Hillary at odds with the Russians isn’t a good thing and it isn’t a bad thing: She does not matter and the Russians do not either.

But it is a cute side show. “the vodka is agreeable but the meat has gone bad” is fine;
“the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak” would mean nothing to Miss Hillary, the White Trash MonicaMan, the Obaminites or the Russian Thugocracy. I doubt it would mean much to the MSM mugs reporting on it. And if Liberals do “(a) half-assed job” that is not a bad thing–there is no good is doing evil well.

I do not wish to seem to bitter, too worried during Lent–but I do have children and grandchildren to protect from the Obaminites, William Ayres and the like.

” Night Owl:

Too bad we can’t reset the election.” True, but time to start working on the next one.

did i miss something or did she not mention the urgency of dealing with climate change with the russians and palestinians. must be some kind of dissonance compaign she’s running with her “smart” diplomacy operation.

8. vivoLanguages with different characters (Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, etc.) are way more difficult than others.
Monolinguists often believe this hogwash & think such statements make them appear informed.

But in diplomatic circles, professional translators are required at all times.
Clueless again vivo – I’m a Foreign Service embassy-brat, lived the ‘Diplomatic Circles’ life & it’s clear to me you know zero about it and are making it up as you go.

Hee Hee, that was great! Transliteral funning & punning at it’s best. Do you also incorporate a given phrase, translated literally into your native-tongue & use the mangled translation in place of the ‘correct’ phrase? As in something like much more better (mucho mas mejor)

4. Class Clown: — you got it about multicults imagining all cultures are same — reminds me of an episode in Aksyonov’s memoir “In Search of Melancholy Baby” where the author (a Russian immigrant) is asked at a Q&A session by one such what are attitudes in Russia toward their black population. When answered that Russia doesn’t have any, the interlocutor remains incredulous. Aksyonov properly interprets it as you did, Class. In general, the book has some amazing insights that the author may not be aware of himself, e.g. on the permanent wound that Europe suffered with the oil embargo of the seventies.
24. Войска ПВО: — your translator picked a rock about the size of Plymouth Rock.
8. vivo: — alphabet is not what makes Russian hard (“Clockwork Orange” author claimed you need a day or two, tops, to learn phonetic Russian), morphology (word-morphing) does — in Hilary’s case attaching one prefix instead of two.

I’m referring to ordinary citizens. An embassy brat is surrounded by foreign languages in many forms and lives in the countries talking the language: learning is almost automatic. I never needed to learn those languages but was intimidated by what looks like complex symbols and pronunciation. I have no problem with Romance languages and characters.

The Russian Foreign Minister handled it very well. He is not a rookie. I guess the role of First Lady doesn’t really prepare you for a job with actual duties and responsiblities (which senators don’t have).

We have sent our checker players to a chess match.
When I first saw the article about the big orange button, I thought it was political satire. I figured it was from The Onion or something similar.

-First, I would have been too embarrassed to give such a corny and stupid gift in the first place.
-Second, couldn’t they have at least used the Cyrillic alphabet?

What is scary is that condition of our State department. If we don’t have someone competent enough to know the language of one of the world’s superpowers, it shows that we are in big trouble. I have lived in the former Soviet Union 15 years now and have a very good understanding of how they think and feel. I believe what really bugs the Russians is that they have to condescend to talk with inferiors, who represent a nation that is considered more “powerful.” The Soviets respected Reagan and disdained Carter. I believe to a certain degree Putin respected Bush, at least in comparison to the present administration. The Russians will respect a truly strong “opponent” even if they hate them. The also expect to be treated with the same respect. A fake orange button as a gift doesn’t convey respect. (By the way what does a big bright button convey to any of you. Couldn’t we be sending the WRONG message.) Though I have plenty more to say, I better end with this.
At the poker table of world affairs, we have some first rate rummy players.
By the way “overload” is a good translation of the word.

Here in Germany we where told that Obamas girls can learn to talk russian and chinese at their nice shool. So the world only has to wait a little while to see the smart new american diplomacy.Perhaps one of the little Biden boys is learning german just this moment.

Just thinking about the “gift theme”: If Gordon Brown, who is allmost blind,has got those DVDs
perhaps for our chancler Merkel a bikini could be a nice choice. But thinking that America is in “in the heart of a crisis”, one houer Work out whith Michelle would be less expencive and also smart!
But do not think you are alone in the world! When,jears ago, Bill Clinton visitet Berlin, our chancler Schröder made him happy by giving him a cigar in front of the cameras.
There is a special form of politesse on the left

Still stuck on symbolism as opposed to realism. She should have presented him with a battery operated vibrator with the word peregruzka now! Stamped somewhere on it….near a button of some sort. That’s a joke they might have gotten.

Being Secretary of State isn’t one of those jobs that lends itself to being cutesy. And at the risk of understatement, there’s nothing cute about Hillary Clinton. Condee Rice, yes. But Hillary Clinton, no. Please read more at http://www.halfjoking.net

Silly Hilly is a rank amateur lawyer with a shallow feminist attitude who will harm the USA.
Oba appointed her to gain the fem support he depends on for reelection. HRC is as dangerous as her boss, Obama! I do agree with jewel’s comment above; a vibrator would have been an appropriate gift from fem hill! Can anyone
name an accomplishment by either Barack/Hiller?

Thank you all for your comments. I think everyone would agree that eurabitopian gets the prize. Ochen’ horror show! (horosho)

Kurt – How does one reset a computer? Restore factory settings by going through system recovery and lose all your data? Thanks a lot. The correct noun for rebooting a computer is ‘pere-ZA-gruzka’. To reboot is not to reset. And why would Lavrov lie about this? He may indeed lie about something else many times over, but not about some stupid plastic button with nonsensical arrows.

——————————————–
Speaking of jokes and red buttons, here’s a really stupid cold-war Khrushchev joke that I’m sure many Russians will still remember:

Khrushchev is visiting Kennedy in the Oval Office when Kennedy decides to make a joke on the Soviet leader. He sits him at his desk, shows him the switchboard, and says, “You can pick the phones, pull the switches, and do anything you want – just don’t touch this red button here.”

Khrushchev is playing with the switchboard, but he’s getting very curious about the red button. So when the American is not looking, he presses it. Immediately, a boxer glove on a spring flies out of the switchboard and hits Khrushchev on the nose.

Then it comes time for Kennedy to visit Moscow. Khrushchev is showing the US President his Kremlin office, which also has a switchboard with a red button. Khrushchev says, “Sit at my desk, please. You can pick the phones, pull the switches, and do anything you want – just don’t touch the red button.”

Kennedy thinks Khrushchev must be very stupid, to pull the same trick on him. So when the Soviet leader turns away, Kennedy covers his face and pushes the red button. But nothing happens.

But the important thing is that the Obama administration used this meeting to infer that the Bush administration had so screwed up diplomatic relations with Russia that those relations had to be completely “reset.” Thank goodness Hillary is on the job. I think she should be made to wear a reset button around her neck for the next four years.

That’s a funny, right? Hillary is the head of the Department of State. Last I checked that is the department supposedly most qualified to deal with those damn foreigners, like … well, translate words and stuff. Every language learning program, school, etc. I have every attended or heard an advertisement for proclaims loudly that they are used by the wait for it … the Department of State. One would suppose that she is well aware of this. This department is there specifically to prevent these kinds of problems for our diplomats “[w]ith minimum language skills, [who] mispronounce and use the wrong words.”

But even if the brilliant Mrs Clinton had managed to find a competent translator at the State Dept., who gives the Russian foreign minister a silly toy “reset” button? What is she, twelve? This is statesmanship? That’s up there with giving the Prime Minister of the UK a pack of DVDs from Walmart.

Then when she learns that the word says “overcharge”, she starts babbling “Well we’re not gonna let you do that to us!!”
What the hell is she talking about? She’s the idiot standing there with an ‘overcharge” button.

And this stupid “reset button” gimmick isn’t for the benefit of Russian relations in the first place. It’s a childishly obvious slap at the previous administration.
The only reason the Russians would be interested in hostilities between past and present administrations would be if they could exploit them. Do you think Hillary could figure that out? I don’t either.

vivo – I speak Russian, German, French, Spanish, and a little Japanese (and of course, English). I didn’t find any one of them harder than the others. Certain sounds are very different as represented by phonetics, but the ears will tell you. Japanese took just a bit of getting used to, because they speak indirectly. It’s like using passive voice all the time.

I say this, because I seriously looked into becoming a professional interpreter in the 80′s. I found out an ugly truth. It pays squat. I would have to have fluency in 2-7 languages. Further, I would have to have a Masters in one of five fields: PoliSci; MilSci; Engineering; Computers; or International Finance. After accomplishing all this, I would have earned, if fully employed, $5k-$10k more per year than I would if simply working in the field. Full employment as an interpreter is very problematic.

Do you know why it pays squat? Because stupid people who need your services, who would never consider learning a foreign language because it’s too hard, don’t value the skill at all. Like Hillary. You would think someone would try to teach her how to pronounce names correctly. Never screw up someone’s name, nor make jokes about it. They are always very sensitive about their names. Do you think someone maybe tried? Do you think she tried to learn, or maybe instead, she blew them off? I’m thinking it was just a case of, “Good enough for government work.”

Amateurs, the lot of them. Why not put Hillary there? Foreign affairs is the Siberia of the Obama administration. They couldn’t care less. Compare Obama’s selection of Hillary to Bush’s selections of Colin Powell and Condi Rice. Guess Bush wasn’t so dumb after all.

Voiska PBO – The correct word is “kameni” (stones). even in English, rocks are big things weighing many… stones. Telling children to stop throwing rocks creates a funny picture to someone who knows the meanings of words.

“I say this, because I seriously looked into becoming a professional interpreter in the 80’s. I found out an ugly truth. It pays squat.”

Yes, it’s a sad truth. I also tried to do some translation work and it wasn’t worth it: lots of work for little pay. And bilingual people are not paid any more than monolinguals at many service or supervisory jobs. You just have to be self-motivated to learn other languages.

Thank you, 58. Red Square, for understanding that the problem with this pathetic scenario is not the poor translation, but the fact that Mrs. Clinton is so provincial, so unthinking, so self-absorbed with her own grudges, that she could not figure out that a Russian could look at her sad little “overcharge” button and see it as a LAUNCH button. This is the brilliant woman who all my feminist friends just had to have as their president.

Pretty sure “perigruzka” is also used in an engineering context to mean “proof load”. In this sense the meaning of Hill’s infamous button could be described as: “test beyond normal operating range to see if anything breaks”.

I’m not sure what crappy translator Oleg is using, but “the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak” does not translate into “the vodka is agreeable but the meat has gone bad” (instead we get “Дух бодр, но плоть слаба”)

And “out of sight, out of mind” does not translate into “invisible lunatics” (instead we get с глаз долой, из сердца вон).

Both of these translations are correct. I didn’t use some exotic translation program for this – simply Google translate http://translate.google.com/ I think even the US State Department has access to such high technology.

The problem with Clinton’s poor translation was not as complicated as you make out. They simply did it wrong. It was a very lame joke in both the US and in Russia. It was not some cultural mistake that illustrates the difference in American and Russian cultures. It was just a bad joke that no one outside of Clinton’s office would ever find funny.

I think that Clinton and her smarter diplomacy were right. “Overcharge” and not “reset” seems to be the mandate of the new administration. Overcharge trillions in new social experimental spending. Overcharge the expectations of diplomacy. Overcharge the expectations of hope. Overcharge the Iranians for their new bomb and air defense. Overcharge all of the credit cards. Overcharge the coming taxes and inflation and price of crude. Overcharge the endless list of radical changes.

Secretary Clinton’s only gaffe was that the button was given to the wrong recipient. The Obama administration should not have given the “Overcharge” button to Russia.
It was meant for the American citizens for the Economic Stimulus Package.

The so-called “reset button” looks morelike a deviceused as an”emergency stop” device (“Noodstop” in Dutch, “Notstop” in German) The average journalist has little real life experinece with this stuff (unless they notice a similar device at their local gas station)